The Global Development Crisis

by Ben Selwyn

The central paradox of the contemporary world is the simultaneous presence of wealth on an unprecedented scale, and mass poverty. Liberal theory explains the relationship between capitalism and poverty as one based around the dichotomy of inclusion (into capitalism) vs exclusion (from capitalism). Within this discourse, the global capitalist system is portrayed as a sphere of economic dynamism and as a source of developmental opportunities for less developed countries and their populations. Development policy should, therefore, seek to integrate the poor into the global capitalist system.

The Global Development Crisis challenges this way of thinking. Through an interrogation of some of the most important political economists of the last two centuries Friedrich List, Karl Marx, Leon Trotsky, Joseph Schumpeter, Alexander Gerschenkron, Karl Polanyi and Amarta Sen, Selwyn argues that class relations are the central cause of poverty and inequality, within and between countries. In contrast to much development thinking, which portrays ‘the poor’ as reliant upon benign assistance, this book advocates the concept of labour-centred development. Here ‘the poor’ are the global labouring classes, and their own collective actions and struggles constitute the basis of an alternative form of non-elitist, bottom-up human development.

Genres: Economics

224 pages, Hardcover

First published February 7, 2014

Reviews

[Tobi ﾄﾋﾞ · Rating 5 out of 5]

an excellent comprehensive overview !!! sited this like crazy oops

[Nick · Rating 3 out of 5]

Selwyn's relatively short book is worth reading for the following insights. First, his discussion of Schumpeter, List and associated statist economics is in-depth and well-constructed though he could have more clearly separated Schumpeter from Keynes and the post-Keynesian literature of today (e.g. Chang and Grabel). The latter are statist, but there is a big difference between the corporate conservative perspective of Schumpeter and Chang and Grabel's incorporation of democratic structures (even if those structures are rather paternalistic and orthodox, as Selwyn rightly indicates). Secondly, Selwyn replaces the functionalism of orthodox Marxism with the promise of a relational Marxism based significantly on Freire. That Selwyn does not effectively articulate this movement Marxism, combining industrialized labor with other forms of resistance, is a fundamental weakness. Books such as Dangl's recent Dancing with Dynamite: Social Movements and States in Latin America dig deeper into these movements in the context of Latin America, more completely fulfilling Selwyn's promise. Thirdly, and most innovatively, Selwyn articulates the idea of hyper-babbagization (globalization as process of labor discipline and wage depression) as an explanation for divide-and-rule TNC techniques of global production so as to increase the profit share and sustain core consumption through subsidies gained from wage suppression in the periphery. If the contention between hyper-babbagization and social movement resistance had been the sole concentration of the book, rather than the relatively light coverage of contending critiques of orthodox neoclassical economics, this may have been a much more valuable book.

Bottom-line, the book's basic weakness lies in the thinness of analysis, particularly with regard to Polanyi. Polanyi's anthropological analysis is much broader than the argument that he was embedded in institutional market economics. The idea that Polanyi was wedded to economistic thinking in ways that Marx escaped is a strange argument for me. In the attempt to separate Polanyi from Marx, rather than incorporating their similarities, Selwyn's analysis is very different and rather less interesting than the excellent Marx-inspired analysis of David Harvey in A Brief History of Neoliberalism (see also Block and Somer's excellent The Power of Market Fundamentalism), which uses Polanyi rather than attempting to show that Polanyi is not critical enough of neoclassical economics. More relevant to Selwyn's development focus is the longer, more densely theoretical and ultimately more satisfying book by Peet and Hartwick, Theories of Development, Second Edition: Contentions, Arguments, Alternatives, which does a much better job than Selwyn of integrating and analyzing contending schools of thought.

[Bill Crane · Rating 5 out of 5]

An excellent book surveying the history of development studies and strategy from the classics (List) to the postwar state-centric political economists (Gerschenkron) and contemporary popular approaches (Sen) from a Marxist perspective. Though at times disjointed in structure, Selwyn provides a compelling case for the superiority of the Marxist approach as against state-centrered political economists from the 1800s to Ha-Joon Chang, Alice Amsden and the contemporary cohort of "heterodox" development scholars, drawing out their similarities to (neo)liberal economic thought in that the main priority of both trends is *economic* development from a residualist perspective within the capitalist world economy, which necessarily requires heavy exploitation and misery carried out against the global working classes.

Particularly valuable also are his chapters that critique the more "humanist" approaches of Karl Polányi and Amartya Sen, showing that their visions of economic equality and the development of human potential are unrealizable under the capitalist system, thus fundamentally contradicting their visions. His proposal of the work of Marx and Leon Trotsky as the building blocks for a theory of "labour-centered development" should be read by all left-leaning students and academics in the field.

[Em · Rating 4 out of 5]

From the perspective of an International Development student/graduate, this book is a solid introduction into critical and alternative views on development, both as a process and as a school of thought. I found it particularly useful to learn about key theories and theorists in political economy beyond mainstream liberal scholars. Only criticism (which the author himself acknowledges) is how it covers mostly European men thinkers and the concept of class from a Eurocentric perspective. However, the book's main arguments remain valuable, provided they are taken, and critically analysed, in conjunction with feminist, Southern, post-colonial and decolonial scholarship. Overall, it is a good work of critical analysis which is accessible and rich, with the added bonus of offering solutions and alternatives which are worth considering and exploring.